Hey, I'm Xaereth, welcome to Delusions of Grandeur! This is a blog dedicated (mostly) to competitive play in miniature gaming, mostly about 40k and some other stuff mixed in. We have a couple writers now (Xaereth and Spaguatyrine), both of whom attend multiple GTs every year, and even enjoy a modicum of success from time to time. Enjoy your stay!

Labels

Wednesday, October 28, 2009

Well, I went to the Semis, and was rather disappointed. I took what I think was a pretty reasonable list, but ended up losing one, tying one, and getting one massacre. Here's a recap of the action:

Game 1: Orcs and Goblins

Well, I played against a guy that I had (a year and more ago) played in my final game in 'Ard Boyz 40k Semi-Finals (and won by massacre, giving me 1st place in the tournament). He was the eventual winner of the entire event, though I can't help but feel cheated by the dice and quite a few of the rules he imposed, such as march blocking w/ fanatics (when he can't). He was a nice enough guy, but I left the game feeling like if I had to play two more guys like him, the tournament would be a long, long day.

Highlights include my Cold Ones failing their first two stupidity checks, then getting raped by a doom diver, my Hydra flamering 2 fanatics in my way, and rolling a 1 to wound both times (needing a 2+) with the fanatic going on to cause 6 wounds on my Black Guard, and his doom divers/bolt throwers with 6 leadership (he used 6, anyways, someone later told me it was actually 5?) passing EVERY terror/fear check they had to make (somewhere around 15 checks, all told). The biggest though, was my positioning my Black Guard to take a charge from his general's unit and a big block of orks on both flanks (but knowing I can kill enough that I probably won't take too many casualties), but holding both squads there for a rear charge from my dragon and some dark riders in both rears. I killed the front row of both orc blocks (using always strikes first), and so only lost like 3 black guard to his general. He still won combat because of the flanks, ranks, mass, etc. but thats what Stubborn Ld. 10 is for, right? I roll: 12. Okay, well thats what my BSB is there for, right? Reroll: 11 And then I run 3" and he runs me down.

On top of that, he took a long time to play, and so negated me getting a final turn anyways. I barely squeaked out a draw there. 11-11. Blah.

Game 2: Beastmen

I'd never played beastmen before, but I'd heard they were an 'easy' army to beat. Not so. This guy had apparently been ONLY playing beastmen for a long time, and was using a hero that allowed to 'ambush' with his entire army. He left his 6 chariots on the table, with his dragon ogres, and then 'ambushed' me with the rest.

His main guy used magic to charge my Cauldron of Blood, and his big block of Bray Shamans w/ gors charged a Hydra. CoB Hag challenged, got slaughtered by a guy that had S10, A14 or something stupid (and kept rolling wounds until he rolled a 1). He got overkill 7, and won, but I got away. He would then try to finish off the rest of the attendants the rest of the game, finally succeeding.

Other highlights include my Dreadlord with Executioner's axe ending two chariots, and the assassins w/ rending stars slaughtering his other 4 chariots and lord/hero/general guy. Also, my charged Hydra butchered the shaman squad he had sent at me during 2nd turn, and proceeded to go on a rampage.

I ended up tabling him for full points, 24-1.

Game 3: Ron Santoni's Demons of Tzeench

Well, as you probably don't know, me and Ron Santoni have been nemesi since we met more than a year ago at my first Tacticon, when I had to play against his demons. I'd never played against demons, but we had a very close game, and ended up with a perfect draw. He then went on to place 5th at the Vegas GT with that list. He ended up winning the 40k 'Ard Boyz Semi-finals this year, though in my defense, I wasn't there as I had to go to my friend's wedding. In the final match of a team tournament my friend and I had played in, we had to play against Ron, and we ended up with full points. Overall, a great guy, and really skilled player. The only problem is: I've never played against demons in Fantasy, and he has power dice Tzeench Demons.

He's a good player, and though I think the mission screwed me a bit, it was a rather sad matchup anyways. My Hydras didn't get their Regen saves against most of his shooting/casting, and most of his (very strong) spells only needed a 3+ to go off. It was a pretty brutal game, but he ended up killing most of my army, for a Major Loss to the Dark Elves. I'm happy to note, however, that I killed every herald in his army, and WOULD have killed the Bloodthirster a FEW times over, if he hadn't gotten re-rolls on EVERY armor save/ward save/leadership/to hit/to wound roll from the scenario. As it turned out, we were using the wrong scenarios for the tournament, and we shouldn't have been using those ones at all, as they were apparently last year's.

So, I didn't place in the tournament, and it was a little sad, but it was a fun game against Ron at the end, and I learned a lot about the various armies out there. I'll play next year, with my goal being to actually place this time!

Wednesday, October 21, 2009

The shop in Laramie, WY that I used to play at all the time before I moved an hour away to Fort Collins, CO, had a tournament and I decided to attend, since I’m friends with most of the guys that play down there, and I needed to go to Laramie anyways.

A grand total of 6 people decided to show up to the tournament. We had been hoping for around 10-14 to show up, so it ended up being somewhat of a flop. But, we all wanted to play anyways, so we decided to go for it. In attendance, there were three different Imperial Guard players, 2 chaos marines, and myself playing my antiquated but not yet downtrodden Blood Angels.

I played a very similar list to this at BoLS Con earlier this summer, and came 7th overall. The main difference was that I took out an 8-man Veteran squad w/ 2 meltas and 3 PF in a rhino, and added the Baal Predators. The main reason I added the Preds was that I was getting bored of ONLY rhino-rush, and decided I could stand to have some shooting in the army. I figured it would make my overall army softer, but in the pursuit of fun, I decided to take them anyways.

Game 1: Blood Angels vs. Rain’s Imperial Guard!

My opponent was actually a guy who also decided to come down from Fort Collins to play, and he brought Imperial Guard with inducted Sisters of Battle. Here’s his list (in general, I didn’t keep any armylists):

It was a fairly interesting list, and I knew that Yarrick could be a pain in the ass. The Vendettas would be a pain, if he used them correctly. I wasn’t certain how effective the Sisters could be, since it’s one of the rare armies that I haven’t had much of a chance to play much against.
Scenario:
Standard 12” deployment, Night Fight on the first turn.

Primary: There would be a total of 4 objectives this game, but there was a twist- each player’s objectives would be deepstriking at the end of turn 2. The players could choose where they wanted their objectives to deepstrike to.

Secondary: Kill opponent’s highest point HQ

Tertiary: Don’t allow your opponent to control ANY objectives by the end of the game

Pregame thoughts: Wow, I did NOT want to play against this army with these objectives. He could just deepstrike his objectives into a single corner and deny me the ability to claim any of his own, while using the vendettas to contest my own objectives. I needed to threaten both corners as fast as I could.

Deployment: He won the roll and decided to let me go first. I combat squadded my missile launcher tac squad, and put the missile launcher in the middle of the table, on top of a big temple. To the left of the temple, I bunkered my rhinos, with 2 Baal Predators on the flanks and a single 5-man tac squad in the middle, the veteran rhino and other two troop rhinos sitting behind the predators. Death Company set up spread out amongst the tanks. 2 Attack Bikes I placed on my far left flank, 2 on my far right, and 1 behind all the tanks.

He placed the LR on the back of his board edge, slightly to the left of my forces. The Sister rhinos he placed 12” up, also to the left of my forces, and the Chimera holding Yarrick, the Cannonness, and Celestians to the right of them. He held all 3 Vendettas in reserve, and placed his junior officer squad in his far left corner. He decided not to seize the initiative, so I began my turn.

Turn 1- Blood Angels:

I moved everything forward, and popped smoke on my Baal Predators and front troop squad. The two bikes on the left decided to only move 12” up and take a pot shot at the far left sister’s rhino, which they somewhat surprisingly wrecked. The two bikes on the right turbo-boosted straight forward.

Turn 1- Imp/Sisters:

He moved everyone forward and popped smoke, except for the sister who were wrecked, who stayed where they were. Pask tried to shoot, but failed his sight test. The wrecked sisters shot at the bikes that had turbo-boosted to the right (about 23” off) and scored 5 wounds with 9 boltgun shots. I proceeded to fail 4 saves, and suddenly I had no threat to my right flank.

Turn 2- Blood Angels:

Everything moved forward, my two tactical squad rhinos moving up to fire 6” at the remaining sister rhino. The veterans moved to take a 6” melta shot at his chimera, and Dante also moved up within 6” of the chimera to shoot his melta. The Baal Predators both got OCE and moved the full 12”, the right one toward the right, and the left one straight toward Pask. The original 2 melta bikes moved forward another 12” toward Pask, but still close enough to shoot at the rear armor of the sister’s rhino.

3 multi-melta shots, 4 melta gun shots, 1 missile launcher shot, and 8 assault cannon shots later, neither the rhino nor the chimera had been harmed in any way. I had forgotten about the sister rhino’s ‘ninja smoke’ that only allows glancing hits.

I decided not to charge the Death Company into the chimera, since I didn’t want them to get demo-charged by Marbo. The celestians would have to get out next turn, or die, since I had enough melta to force them out. Death Company would be able to react to just about any squad moving around, and my Veterans were in the rhino ready to charge out in reaction to either mounted squad.

Turn 2- Imp/Sisters:

He rolled for reserves, and got a Vendetta, Marbo, and the stormtroopers.
The stormtroopers he deepstruck behind a rhino, getting a direct hit on his scatter die. The vendetta came in on my left side, in the corner, only moving 6” on. Marbo predictably appeared behind the Death Company.

He disembarked his Celestians w/ Cannoness and Yarrick, and prepared to charge my veteran rhino w/ Corbulo, as well as my Baal Predator on the right. His forcibly-disembarked Sister shuffled backwards, for some reason shying from the fight. His other sisters stayed in their rhino, to double-tap from the inside.

Shooting killed the leftmost Baal Predator (Pask), the rightmost Baal Predator (Vendetta), a rhino in the back (Stormtroopers), and 3 Death Company (Marbo). He assaulted my veteran rhino, and exploded it, killing NOBODY, but putting a wound on my lone attack bike in the middle.

-Interlude-

We then deepstruck our objectives. I put both of mine close to my ‘sniper’ tactical combat squad, and he put one objective down in the far corners of his deployment zone (one far right-back, one far left-back). This was great news for me, since I had almost no presence on the right, and would have been hard-pressed to get ANYTHING to that corner in time to contest it. On the left, I had a chance, however.

Turn 3- Blood Angels:

I disembarked a 5-man tactical squad, preparing to slaughter the Stormtroopers. The veterans moved in anticipation of fighting the Celestians, and the Death Company w/ Dante moved to kill the final rhino. The two meltabikes moved to within 1” of Pask, ready to kill him, and my assault squad zoomed their rhino over toward my objectives, to help support the 5-man tac squad holding both of them. My lone melta bike moved toward his Vendetta, just outside of 12” range.
Shooting didn’t do much. All 3 of my Meltabike missed, though Dante did manage to explode the Sister’s rhino, killing 2 in the explosion. The veterans shot up the Celestians, killing 1. Time to charge.

Dante was my hero, killing 6 of the Sisters. Death Company attacked afterwards, causing only 11 wounds on the remaining two sisters, none of them rending. He then saved all 11, and refused to break due to the Book of St. Lucius. On the right, he used his book to make his entire squad’s saves invulnerable. I still managed to kill 7 Celestians, and Yarrick, for a single wound back. They pass their Ld 10 stubborn roll. My tac squad charged and murdered the 5 poor stormtroopers. Melta bikes charged Pask and stunned him.

Turn 3- Imp/Sisters:

He rolled and got both his other Vendettas in, one on my right, one on my left. The one on the right predictably sat on his objective, and his left one moved 12” toward my objectives, about 12” from them. The other left one moved slightly, getting ready to shoot. Yarrick rolled to see if he gets up and… didn’t! YES! His sisters and junior command squad continued to huddle in some ruins on the left, for some reason. I think he was planning on having them hold his leftmost objective.

In assault, Death Company/Dante caused another 13 wounds, and he saved all but 1, but his Sister w/ the Book of St. Lucius survives. They cause zero wounds back, fail their stubborn 9 Ld and I catch the sisters. My veterans continued to fight the Celestians, who rolled to stay invulnerable, and did. I killed zero sisters and inflict zero wounds this round, despite wounding about 15 times. He rolled and killed 4 Veterans. I roll and… get a 3 on my Ld. Whew! My 2 bikes hit Pask, who was forced to stand still, and destroyed him with Krak Grenades!

Turn 4- Blood Angels:

Death Company moved toward the remaining Sister squad, ready to assault them. Melta Bikes move to assault the junior command squad, behind them. My assault squad got out of their rhino, ready to assault the Vendetta threatening my objectives. A tac squad moved toward the same Vendetta in their rhino, disembarked, and ready to shoot melta.

Shooting… failed. I missed every shot. In assault, against the Vendetta I whiffed everything.

The Bikes killed all of the junior officers, and Death Company killed every single Sister in the squad. The Veterans finally did well, finishing the pesky Cannoness and her other 2 celestians.

Turn 4- Imp/Sisters:

He moved one Vendetta toward my objectives, contesting one of them. The other Vendetta he moved toward his own objective near the corner, for 23” of movement. No real shooting, since he wanted his flat-out saves.

Turn 5- Blood Angels:

Death Company and Bikes in the corner converge on the Vendetta on his objective. At my objective, all of my troops prepare to shoot down his Vendetta and assault.
Dante and the Bikes missed their shots, and so does every melta near my right side. My missile launcher shoots and… WRECKS the Vendetta. Whew! He places his troops in a way that I can’t assault them but they can still move to contest both objectives next turn but then I remember- he has to see if he was pinned! He rolls and gets an 11- stuck where he is. In combat the Death Company/Dante/bikes whiff every attack, and it’s his turn.

Turn 5- Imp/Sisters:

He disembarks his veterans on the left, and shoots at Death Company, trying to take them off his objective, and failing.

We roll to see if the game ends- and it does. 2 Objectives to 1- Blood Angels.
Results: Win for the Blood Angels- 35/45 points (25 for Primary, 10 for Secondary, 0/10 for Tertiary)

Well, I was happy to see that I had won the stupid thing after I thought I’d be playing for a Tie the entire game. Still, it was a little frustrating to play a scenario that I couldn’t EVER contemplate getting the tertiary.

Game 2: Blood Angels vs. CJ’s Imperial Guard!

Well, my friend CJ is a pretty good tournament player, though he had brought an army that was entirely experimental this tournament. Here’s what he had (to the best of my recollection):

This army had tabled my friend who plays a really tough Plague Marine army in 4 turns. It was no joke, he had way too many S5/S6/S8/S9 shots available. No melta, ironically enough.

Scenario:

Standard 12” Deployment again, Nightfight again

Primary Objective: We placed a single objective in the center of the table. This objective was called the ‘git’ and he had stolen the keys, and we needed them back. Every player turn, he moved 2D6 in a direction determined by a scatter dice. If we rolled a ‘hit’ result, the rolling player got to choose the direction. Whoever controlled the git at the end won. If we wanted to kill the Git, we had to roll 6’s to hit, no roll to wound, but he had a 2+ invuln. save

Secondary: Kill the opponent’s highest point HQ

Tertiary: Ensure that the git is alive, and control him (it seemed a bit redundant, to have to control him by the end again)

Deployment: I won the roll and decided to let him go first- it was night fight again, and I wanted him to waste a round of shooting. I also wanted the advantage of rushing the objective in the final turn. So he deployed everything except for al’Rahem, and 4 other Chimeras. He also kept the Stormtroopers in reserve. His two russes he kept at the ends of his gunline, with his chimeras all in between the two.

I deployed everything between two buildings in the center of the board. I had decided there was no way that I could kill even close to all of his army, and I needed to distract him and hopefully get the jump on the objective at the end of the game.

Turn 1- Guard:

The ‘git’ jumped directly toward HIS table edge 7”.

He tried to shoot everything and failed to see anything of mine, and the guys that saw me, failed to do damage.

Turn 1- Blood Angels:

The ‘git’ jumped back my direction 9”, still roughly in the center of the table.

I moved everything forward. In the very center of the table there were a cluster of buildings, and I decided to bunker down here, on top of the objective. I kept my Baal Predators on the outside, blocking all shots coming in at me, and popping smoke on them and a single rhino. I ran Death Company up 6”, and they spread out, ready to take incoming tank fire. The melta bikes turbo-boosted on either flank of mine, ready to melt some russes.

Turn 2- Guard:

Both of his reserves came in- the stormtroopers on the left side and Al’Rahem w/ his 5 chimeras on the right side. Everything else stays still.

The ‘git’ decided to move more closely under my control, moving 5” more to my side, fully within the bunker now.

Shooting commences at my bikes first. The bikes on the left, shot at by the Stormtroopers and a single Multi-laser, took 4 wounds and… 2,2,2,2 it up, and die extremely annoying deaths. The lone bike in the middle met a similar fate. On the right, he shot all the multi-lasers at the bikes on the right, and only managed to kill one of them. All other fire was directed into rhinos and Baal Predators, and when the smoke cleared, only one assault cannon turret had been blown off.
Turn 2- Blood Angels:

The ‘Git’ moved another 3” under my control.

I moved Death Company up, ready to assault a Chimera. Everyone else stayed in the bunker. Note that I HAD planned on moving my Veteran squad up outside the bunker as well, ready to assault next turn. I forgot though. I DID move a random 5-man tactical squad up on the right flank though, popping smoke. They had an important mission to accomplish.

Not much shooting accomplished anything, Dante having missed yet again with his BS5 meltagun. In assault they wreck a random Chimera, and 7 of the crew get vaporized, but the rest of them hold on all moral checks, and Death Company is looking into the face of a LOT of shooting next turn.

Turn 3- Guard:

The ‘Git’ moved 11” away from me, toward Al’Rahem’s side of the board. Dangit!

He shot at Death Company with everything he had, and his VERY last shot ended up frying Dante himself. Dangit! The stormtroopers on the left shot and destroyed a Baal Predator. On the right, my last meltabike bit the dust as well.

Turn 3- Blood Angels:

The ‘Git’ moved another 5” in the direction of Al’Rahem’s Chimera.

I moved my entire line, trying to protect the ‘git’, knowing it’s useless. I disembarked my 5-man tactical squad, and moved it into range of a Chimera that hadn’t moved last turn (and more importantly, had . My Veteran squad with Corbulo moved forward in the direction it should have gone the turn before, and popped smoke.

The tac squad melta missed, predictably, and they charged the Chimera, and randomly, the two Armored Sentinals (I figured I didn’t feel like getting shot to death next turn clustered up against a Chimera like that). They blew up the Chimera, which held the Company Command Squad, and win combat against the walkers, but of course the Sentinals just pile in, doing no damage.

Turn 4- Guard:

The ‘Git’ moved a little bit toward my line, but not much at all.

This was the turn he spent shooting my Veteran Rhino, and hardly scratched the paint. I rolled 5 cover saves in a row vs. Penetrates, and the shots that did get through he rolled 1’s or 2’s.
Turns out S5 and S6 isn’t the best for popping rhinos. He also destroyed my Baal Predator on the right, and moved Al’Rahem himself up, getting ready to assault next turn.

Turn 4- Blood Angels:

The ‘Git’ moved downward, away from me.

I moved my rhinos 6”, getting a few good shots at a couple Chimeras on the right side. The Veterans ran out, and got ready to assault the Company Command Squad, and the surviving 3 from the other already destroyed Chimera, and another random Chimera in range.

In Combat, the Veterans tore the CCS a new a-hole, and crushed the chimera. The tactical squad killed a Sentinal, for no losses.

Turn 5- Guard

This would be our last turn, since his shooting phases had taken so freakin’ long, lol.
The ‘Git’ moved further away from both of us, downward.

He moved a couple Chimeras up to contest the ‘git’, one of them full of an infantry squad, with a Commissar.

His shooting didn’t do a whole lot, killing about 5 veterans, and denting a couple random rhinos. He assaulted with Al’Rahem against my 5-man tactical, and killed nothing, and my tactical whiffed and also killed nothing.

Turn 5- Blood Angels:
The ‘Git’ moved 3”, and stayed under the bootprint of the chimeras he had moved on top. Shite.
I moved everyone out of the rhinos, and prepared to charge and destroy 2 chimeras and 11 guardsmen with an assault squad and 5-man tactical squad, in one round.

Shooting, my melta was able to destroy the guardsmen’s chimera. And in assault… I failed. I killed the majority of the unit, but not enough, and they were stubborn with the Commissar there.. As a sidenote, Al’Rahem went crazy and killed every single remaining Tactical marine. Not that it mattered much, at that point.

Results: Draw for Blood Angels, 25/45 points on the mission (I got the secondary, of killing the highest point HQ).

I really thought I could win this, simply because he was afraid of getting inside my ‘bubble of death’ and was happy to sit there. What I should have done, is kill the stupid ‘Git’ as soon as it was in my territory, so that I could just hide in my bunker til the game ended. But, in the spirit of ‘fun’ I decided not to, and it really did end up biting me in the ass. The good news for me, however, was that I didn’t have to play in the ‘championship’ round, and would get paired down.

Game 3: Blood Angels vs. Austin’s Chaos Space Marine Horde of doom

Well, I was happy with my pairing. Austin is a pretty new player, and I’ve never really had the opportunity to play against him, so it was somewhat exciting to play against him. Here’s his list, roughly:

We rolled for setup, and I let him set up first. I wanted to spread him out as much as I could, since he didn’t have much maneuverability.

He set up on a side with a fence (the only real cover that applies to this battle report). His Havoks on the left side hid behind the fence, with the Chosen Rhino behind it ready to charge forward. To their right, the squad of 10 Berzerkers w/ terminator Lord hung out. Next was the defiler, next was the next Berzerker squad w/ the power armored Lord, next to 10 Chaos Marines, and at the very end were the 5 Possessed.

I castled up on the left side, directly across from the Havoks and Chosen rhino. The Baal Predators were up the whole way, with the rest of my rhinos behind them. The bikes I placed on my flanks, as usual.

I then rolled to sieze the initiative and… 6! Wow, got it. Time to do something with it.

Turn 1- Blood Angels:

I edged my rhinos/ predators up. The melta bikes also moved up and prepared to shoot at the Chosen rhino and defiler.

My shooting was useless, missing every single shot (the assault cannons hit, but failed to roll even a 5 to glance)

Turn 1- Chaos

He moved everyone up, getting a 6 for fleet on his Defiler, and suddenly he’s way too close already. As in, charge my Melta Bikes too close.

His shooting didn’t really do a whole lot, but his Defiler did charge one of my melta bike squads, killing only 1. That was a sad thing for me, since now I couldn’t shoot at it, and next turn he’d wipe the poor bike out.

Kill point count:
Chaos- 0
Blood Angels- 0

Turn 2- Blood Angels:

I jumped the Death Company up to the Defiler, ready to charge the thing and rend it to death. On my left, I moved my assault squad rhino and my 5-man tactical squad rhino up, getting ready to melta his Chosen Rhino. My rightmost Baal Predator moved 12” behind the defiler, blocking off the 10-man berserker squad who would normally be in assault range of the Defiler next turn. I needed to buy the Death Company some more time.

My only shooting triumph was killing the Chosen rhino.

In assault, the Death Company hit almost every time, but rolled only two 6’s for rending, and failed to penetrate the defiler. He squashed my poor remaining bike.

Turn 2- Chaos:

He moved forward again. The chosen, who were in range of my leftmost melta bikes, shot at and killed both easily.

In assault, his leftmost berzerkers charged a rhino who had moved 12”, and whiffed. His rightmost berzerkers assaulted the Baal Predator blocking them, killing it. And in the defiler combat, the Death Company remembered who they were and gutted the Defiler with ease.

Kill point Count:
Chaos- 3
Blood Angels- 2

Turn 3- Blood Angels:

I disembarked my veterans, assault squad, and 5-man tactical squads. Dante joined the Veterans. The Death Company jumped to the right, preparing to dual-assault the normal Chaos Marines and the Possessed. My veteran rhino moved up and again blocked the rightmost Berzerkers w/ lord from getting into combat.

I didn’t shoot anything, as I wanted to make sure I was in combat range.

In assault, the assault squad and tactical squad managed to kill every chosen, for a single loss of the assault squad. They consolidated towards the Havoks. The veterans charged into the Berzerkers w/ Lord. Dante single-handedly killed the lord before he could strike, and the Lightning Claws w/ Preferred enemy and Furious Charge killed all 10 Berzerkers. They consolidated back a little bit. The D-co made a fine mess of the Chaos Marines and Possessed, killing 4 Possessed and 2 Marines for 2 losses. The marines fled combat, but the final possessed passed all it’s no retreat saves, and I couldn’t pursue.

Turn 3- Chaos:

The chaos marines rallied, but couldn’t get back into combat this turn. The berzerkers moved toward the Veterans, but couldn’t get into combat.

I move my tactical squad and assault squad up to the fence, and get ready to charge some havocs. Death Company get ready to charge the Chaos Marines. Veterans w/ Dante and Corbulo get ready to charge the berzerkers.

Again, no shooting to be had.

In assault, my tactical squad rolls a 1 and a 2 to assault, leaving my assault squad high and dry against the havocs. Death Company again kill their prey, but too far away to really get into the rest of the game on the other side of the board. Dante again kills his Lord before he can strike, and the Lightning Claws do their thing again and kill all 10 Berzerkers. My assault marines, at the top, fail to kill a single Havoc (outside the bubble range of Dante/Corbulo) and he kills both in return.

Turn 4- Chaos

He shoots at my tactical marines, and fails to kill them all. With the Havoks as the only models he has on the board, and Dante ready to jump in next turn, we call it a game.

Well, that went pretty well. I thought maybe I was in trouble when I couldn’t kill his Defiler two turns in a row, but once Death Company woke up, they really went on a tear and killed a large portion of his army. Lightning Claw veterans are SO deadly too, it’s really just insane how well 3 marines can do against even berzerkers when they’re backed up with re-rolls everywhere. Dante even pulled his weight this game, killing two Chaos Lords with his I6 on the charge. He rarely if ever takes out his points in a game.

Things I learned:

Imperial Guard can be NASTY. I already knew that, but my friend’s shooting phases lasted so long… there was just so much shooting to be had. It makes me a little sick. I had no way to fight an army like that, except in the way I did.

Baal Predators, while fun, are really not that great as they are right now. The assault cannon has a rough time popping tanks at all, and with almost every army being mech these days, they don’t really find many ‘soft’ targets to bite into.

Foot-slogging marines don’t work too well. I’ve always wondered how they would do, but I’m convinced that mech, at least in this edition, is king.

In the end, I ended up winning best overall, since my Imperial Guard friend from game 2 ended up losing to the guy I played in game 1. I got $40 store credit, so I bought a Chimera for my up-and-coming Imperial Guard army, and saved the rest.

Thanks for reading my battle report, if you have any questions, feel free to ask.

Sunday, October 11, 2009

Well, it snowed on Saturday. It made me a little bit sad, because my friend who was going with me to the tournament in Denver was from Laramie, WY and got snowed in. Still, I decided to go by myself on the somewhat-icy roads, and: nobody showed up. Turns out it snowed all over the state a ton, and even if a lot of people HAD been able to go, it turns out none of the locals even knew about it.

A place that (claims) to have 20 person RTTs (they had a lot of terrain and tables) didn't make sure people would come. Which seems a little bit ridiculous, since they only give out about $95 in prizes (they said $60 gift card for 'first', $35 for 'second') and if the entry fee is $10, that's $100 they get just for letting people roll dice on their tables, with the other $100 guaranteed to be spent AT the store. Seems like they would be telling EVERYONE about the tournament, especially with the economy the way it is.

So, as I was leaving, the guy gives me a $5 gift card just for showing up. It's a nice thing for him to do, and since I don't plan on coming back to Valhallas anytime too soon (it's a 1.5 hour drive) I decide to use it to buy a pot of paint. The guy got a little huffy and annoyed that I would just spend it on paint and not on an overpriced boxed set (they sold their stuff marked up like 10% from even GW prices). The owner KNEW I was from Fort Collins and that I'd taken time out of my day to get there and... whatever. Not sure I'll ever try to go to a tournament there again. The shop seemed cool enough, but it seemed a little bit backwards from the way it should be.

Otherwise though, my friends in WY tell me they're having a 2k 40k tournament this coming weekend, which should be fun if it actually goes down. I'll just take the same list as before, and hopefully do well. They tell me there are a few new players down there, and it'd be fun to meet them. For those of you who don't know, Laramie is the town I lived in and went to school at for a few years, and though I live about an hour away in Fort Collins, CO, I still talk to the guys at the Laramie shop quite a bit.

Well, gonna get outta here for now. Sometime soon I think I'll ramble on a little bit about my Salamanders army and why they just dont' really work and... what can I do to make them more viable?

Thursday, October 8, 2009

This weekend there will be a 2000 point tournament that I'll be attending at 'Valhallas Game' or some such in Denver, CO. I was originally planning on taking my Chaos Marines list w/ lots of berzerkers, but I decided that instead of taking them and *hoping* that my one squad of 5 plague marines get a good melta shot off at enemy land raiders, that I'd rather take my Swords of the Prophet- that is... my Blood Angels.

I recently went to BoLS Con with my Blood Angels, and ended up getting 7th overall. It's a pretty straightforward rhino rush list. Every game was a pretty tricky one to play, and I only ended up straight up losing my very last game, to Orks. Sort of sad, since I essentially had him tabled, but I suppose thats how it goes. His Gretchin held 4 objectives!! Jeeze...

As you can see, lots and lots of melta, and lots of rhino rush. The veterans hit pretty hard in combat, though the regular troops also do a fair amount of damage as well. One turn during BoLS Con, a regular 5-man tactical squad shot a battle wagon, killed it, assaulted the 20 shoota boyz inside, and killed them all, losing only 2 guys. Pretty potent, if you ask me. Dante and Corbulo make my army monsters.

Anyways, after giving my veterans a lot of use, I've come to the conclusion that the power fist veterans aren't actually very good. Sure, they get a lot of high strength attacks if they actually get their attacks, but they never really had the opportunity to hurt anything. And, usually I still had to allocate wounds onto them, killing them prematurely. So, I've decided to go an alternate route: no fist veterans.

Instead, I'm going to blow the dust off of two Baal Predators (with Heavy Bolters), add a few veterans to my Claw Veterans, and bolster my Death Company. There's a few reasons I want to do this:

Fist Veterans are only really good in theory. They never did much the entire tournament besides melta an occational rhino, or help mop up in a combat that I'd already won. The few times I thought they would actually help killing unkillable stuff, they epic failed, getting mowed down by nobs before they could actually do anything.

Baal Predators will add a lot of (I think) needed depth to my army. They actually put the hurt on a lot of troops squads, and have the ability to pop transports as well.

Baal Predators will also force a lot of high strength shots in their direction before getting killed. If my opponent ignores them, they'll take their points worth. I've had a lot of experience with Baals in the past, and they tend to do well in the game.

I'm a little bored with the way my army plays right now. It usually goes this way: move everything up, turbo-boosing bikes. Pop smoke. Next turn, move up again, alternating rhinos so that the front ones can pop smoke and protect the others behind them. Try to pop transports w/ Melta bikes. Next turn, I'm hopefully in charge range, and I kill everything (or try anyways). Rinse. Repeat. There is very little about my army that allows for tactical diversity. Sure, it's a good list, and it requires (I think) a lot of skill to play it, but it can get boring.

And so, I'm going to take the Predators. I'm not sure if it'll make my list more competitive, but I'm tired of having no ability to shoot anything. Half of my game is boring, praying to the dice gods for 3's then 4's with my melta bikes. This will at least give me something to insta-death heavy weapons squads.

Wednesday, October 7, 2009

Well, I'm not really sure why, but for my first post on this blog, I've decided to write about Warhammer Fantasy, and the impending Semi-Finals.

I recently played my Dark Elf army at the Preliminary 'Ard Boyz in Laramie, WY, and somehow ended up winning the whole thing, with 2 massacres and a draw. Here's a link to that particular Battle Report (henceforth I'll be posting the battle reports here as well as on forums): http://www.warseer.com/forums/showthread.php?t=222574

As you are likely to see if you read the report, I don't really play much Fantasy. I love my Dark Elves, and it's a lot of fun to play them casually, but I'm sort of at a loss of what to do against the current 'power builds' out there. It seems to me like my current list is somewhat nasty, but I'm just not sure how well it'll hold up in the greater scheme of things, playing against things like Power Dice Demons- or ANY demons for that matter, Vampire Counts Ghoul armies, Empire Cannon builds, and all the other crazy ones that I don't know about since I don't play very much.

The thing is- the semi-finals are going to be held here in Fort Collins this year, and I'll be attending. I don't see myself as likely to win the tournament by any means- but I would of course LIKE to win it. Winning a free 3000 point army is always a good prize. I won the Semi-Finals last year for 40k, and got an Imp Guard Army, and am just now finally selling off the remaining pieces of it that I don't want- it was like $600 worth of stuff I could sell for a new army. Being as I don't have as much money as I need to go to Adepticon this year, winning would be a great boon to me.

So here are the things that I've decided I need to be able to deal with if I've got any chance of winning the stupid thing (keep in mind they're not the ONLY things I need to beat, just the things I'm most concerned about):

Bloodthirsters- I know that the 3 demon armies that won in Colorado Springs (a very competitive town for most wargaming) all contained a Bloodthirster. The build I'd personally take for a 'thirster includes flaming attacks at S7, armor that negates magic weapons, and rerolls to hit in every round of combat. Scary!

Magic Heavy- I know that the Tzeench PD lists are one of the top lists out there right now. I've read quite a few battle reports involving them just slaughtering their way through the competition to the top, and it makes me nervous. Vamp Counts and Lizardmen also reportedly have awesome magic phases, and I'm sure that the majority of army books can have at least decent magic.

War Machines- Especially Cannons. I just recently read the rules to cannons in the BRB, and they're a bit frightening for a guy with 4 Monsterous Creatures.

Keeper of Secrets/ Slannesh demons- a few of the demon armies I know are coming to the Semis will also be featuring this ridiculous army/combo. The build I'd take on the Keeper would give the demon a total of 8 attacks that ignore armor. Put that on top of S6 AP and a 20" charge, it's scary enough. Factor in the fact that they can have up to 6 Siren Songs in the army, and it's every more scary.

So, thats what I can think of, with my limited knowledge of the game. Here are my thoughts on how to beat these respective threats:

Bloodthirsters- Assassins and Always Strike First. If I can somehow bait the thirster into charging an infantry block with my assassins in it, I think I can potentially kill it without it doing much damage. With Stand and Shoot w/ my assassins' rending stars, I should be able to take a few wounds off of the thing before it gets to me, and then challenge it w/ an assassin, and hopefully combat res it to death. Note that a Dragon/Hydra will likely die to a thirster VERY quickly, at least if you do the math, and they have the 'good' build on it.

Magic Heavy- Ring of Hotek. Thats what I'm praying for. There's no way in hell that I'll be able to dispell much with only 2 scrolls and 3 DD. If I can get them to miscast a few times and possibly end the magic phase, I think I can take great advantage of it.

War Machines- they scare me less than most other builds, actually. With regenerate on my Hydras, it takes a LOT of 'positive' rolls for a cannon to even get through a Hydra's defenses. A cannon needs to essentially NOT roll a misfire on a 5+ (two chances on a 6+), get the distance correct, get a good bounce roll, and wound, and then me fail a 4+ regen save. It's a... less than 33% shot at a single cannon doing anything, assuming perfect guess on distance. Bolt Throwers are even less of a threat, since they have to roll a 4+ to wound, usually, and then roll a great D3 result to do much to me. I'm counting on their luck being average, basically.

Slannesh Demons- I don't really have a good idea. If I can get a charge off with my Dragon on the Keeper of Secrets, I think I can kill it, or at least hold it up for a while. But thats the problem- they choose who and when I charge, because of Siren song, and I can't dispell it. I also can't afford to flee with my dragon. If I can kill the heralds and Seeker, I think the black guard can handle the blocks of daemonettes w/ always strikes first I6. Just gotta get their herald to accept a challenge from an assassin and I'll be golden.

I also have an idea- put the Executioner's axe on my ground-pounding Dreadlord. This will allow me to HANDLE monsterous creatures that come to fight me, with the exception of the keeper of secrets (who will strike first and kill me, most likely) and the Bloodthirster, who will null the affects of the axe.

I had thought of adding a manticore w/ the ground-pounding dreadlord on it, and putting a master w/ great weapon in the black guard as my general, but it seems rather risky to have a 2W model w/ no ward save as the general. I suppose I could make him my BSB, and get better combat res, but then I'd have to keep one of the dreadlords as the General, which makes my other units have to stay near him to use his leadership bubble, and I need him to be out and about, killing things. I think in the end the best idea is to just keep the configuration the way it is right now. What I WILL do is take out a block of 10 crossbows and add 10 executioners- they'll be a cheap but effective way to flank charge things, as well as threaten high armored units, forcing them to deal with the executioners.

Thats about all I have for now. I realize that since this blog is ENTIRELY new, most people will likely have to do without ever knowing what this post says, but in the off chance that someone DOES end up reading it, tell me what you think. Any opinions on how to change my list to deal with the more 'powerful' builds? Alright, peace out for now.

Well, though I doubt that many people will ever end up reading this blog, I've decided to create it anyways. I've always been a writer, and I've always been an avid wargamer, so I decided to create this blog as a tool for myself (and others) to give voice to my thoughts on the game, and ideas that I have about it.

I suppose a few things about myself are in order first:

I play both Warhammer 40k and WFB, though the majority of my love/concentration goes into 40k rather than WFB. I feel that 40k is by far the more balanced system, and that if a player has a good grasp on the tactics of the game, and understands how it works, they can win with almost any army. Obviously there are some armies that need a little boost to be able to be competitive again, but in general, the game is about as balanced as a game of it's nature can really be.

I'm currently a student in Colorado, attempting a Creative Writing degree, and am also currently working on writing a fantasy book. Though I like writing it, it's also a nice 'escape' to be able to write about other things, i.e. this blog.

Thats about what I have to say, hopefully people will start reading this eventually, though I'm sure that by the time this blog becomes as famous as BoLS, this particular post will remain in obscurity.